Senate Shoots Down Concealed-guns Bill

May 31, 1986|By Donna Blanton, Sentinel Tallahassee Bureau

TALLAHASSEE — A surprise attempt by Senate Republican Leader Richard Langley to bring the concealed-weapons bill to the Senate floor Friday was defeated after Senate President Harry Johnston gave up his gavel to argue against the effort.

Strongly supported by the National Rifle Association, the bill would strip counties of the authority to issue concealed-weapons permits and give the authority to the state. That would mean much more lenient standards to carry a concealed weapon in many parts of the state.

Gov. Bob Graham vetoed a nearly identical bill last year and the Senate, with strong lobbying from

Johnston, D-West Palm Beach, failed to override that veto early in the legislative session. The House then passed a new bill and sent it to the Senate, where Johnston referred it to two committees. Neither considered the bill.

As soon as the Senate convened Friday morning, Langley, R-Clermont, moved to put the bill on the special order calendar. That would have required a two- thirds vote to waive the rules. To consider the issue on the floor would have required unanimous consent. Langley's motion was rejected 22 to 12.

Johnston came to the floor to debate the issue, handing over his gavel to Sen. Ed Dunn, D-Ormond Beach. He argued that it would be a bad precedent to waive the rules and bring up a bill that had not been heard in committee.

''The process is more important than the ultimate outcome,'' Johnston said. ''What Senator Langley is setting into motion is a violation of the process.'' Johnston drew an unlikely ally in Sen. Dempsey Barron, a strong supporter of the bill and a political enemy of Johnston.

Barron, a Panama City Democrat who has been in the Legislature for 30 years and served as rules chairman for several terms, said he opposed waiving the rules to bring up the bill. ''The real issue here is political rather than substantive,'' Barron said.

Langley and NRA lobbyist Marion Hammer charged that Johnston waited to refer the House bill to committees until after they ceased to meet.

''He did not want the bill to come up,'' Hammer said. ''What we wanted to do was to expose what he was doing, to provide an opportunity for the people of this state to see what he was doing. One man is standing in the way of what the vast majority of people in this state want.''

Johnston hotly denied the charge, saying he sent the bill to the Governmental Operations and Judiciary-Criminal committees the same day he received it from the House.